What have they done to orange?!?
The original Mother drink was perhaps one of the biggest failures to hit the energy drink market in Australia, and the newly-redesigned (and significantly better) Mother was relaunched to impressive fanfare - and sales. Since then we've been bestowed with another flavour of Mother, a decidedly...orange one. However, whoever decided that this actually tasted like orange, they were sorely mistaken.
Dubbed Surge, this new Mother comes in at the same price as the original flavour, and it'll cost you roughly $3.60 for a 500mL can. Contained within its aluminium frame is 160mg of caffeine with 2000mg of taurine, hitting the maximum legal ceiling in Australia of 32mg of caffeine per 100mL. Even though Surge is orange flavoured, it only has 0.1g of sugar per 100mL more than standard Mother, at 10.4g, so it shouldn't be teeth-crushingly sweet. In fact, it's quite the opposite.
Imagine, for a minute, the ripest, sweetest orange you've ever eaten. It's bursting with orangey flavour, perfectly sweet and juicy, and is so good you feel like trading your other less exciting fruits (here's looking at you, rockmelon) for more. Pictured? Good. Take that same picture and dip it into a bubbling vat of citric acid, then blend it up with a heady mix of cheap supermarket soft drink, and put it in the sun for three weeks. You'll be somewhere close to the taste of Surge.
From the first burst of harsh metallic tang that invades your senses once you open the can, to the slightly overeager fizzing carbonation pushing its way out, this isn't the best opening we've ever seen. The first sip is like placing your lips against a dehumidifier in a sweaty changeroom, and swallowing is like drinking what that aforementioned dehumidifier had sucked out of the air. A cloying sourness chases its way down your throat, finally making its encampment near your lower intestines, ready to begin its raid on the rest of your body.
It's not so bad at that either, and even though it tastes like the inside of a lumberjack's boot, Surge certainly has enough power to wake you up. Whether it is the taste or the feeling of dying slightly more with every drop, you'll be ready to do whatever it is that you needed an energy drink for (or strip paint off someone's car).
Perhaps due to its less-than-appealing flavour, we managed to grab this can at an on-sale price of $2.60, and even at the lower price we still feel that it isn't so great. While it doesn't taste as bad as the Mana Energy Potion, Surge is also 10x the amount of liquid - and we've barely struggled through two thirds of it. But ultimately, is it an improvement over regular Mother?
No. No it isn't.
Issue: 133 | February, 2012